Crowd Funding website project.

[3for3]

Hello,

I created a Kick Starter project a few days ago for my SunLay beach towels. I have not gotten one single backer yet, though it has only been three days I am still feeling anxious.

I am able to edit the project, so I want to ask the community here to check out my project page and give me unbiased feedback.

Good people like yourselves will be viewing the project and deciding if they want to pledge monies, so I want to hear it from you all.

Here is a link to SunLay Fashion beach towel on KickStarter.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/867...?ref=nav_search

 

[raytseng]

ha, you should feel anxious, cause this is not something that's just going to turn around.
half of battle of these projects is popularity and knowing how to run a social media.

Do you think girl scout cookies sell themselves?

 

[Rand]

Thats a horrid kickstarter, you need to have goals and tell people what they are getting for certain donation levels.

Also maybe some people feel that you dont need a bowtie shaped towel to show off their body?


Do you expect people to just randomly give you money for your business? That's not exactly how crowdfunding works.

Unless its a donation for cancer medical bills or something doubtful people will just give you money to make money with.

 

[3for3]

Originally Posted By: raytseng
ha, you should feel anxious, cause this is not something that's just going to turn around.
half of battle of these projects is popularity and knowing how to run a social media.

Do you think girl scout cookies sell themselves?



Once I get the inventory I will do well with marketing, and sales. Boutique stores want them, individuals ask me for them, so I need to get inventory to sell.

I need feedback on my KickStarter project, and my SunLays, too.

 

[3for3]

Originally Posted By: Rand
Thats a horrid kickstarter, you need to have goals and tell people what they are getting for certain donation levels.

Also maybe some people feel that you dont need a bowtie shaped towel to show off their body?


Okay, that's the feedback I want to hear. About the project and product. Cool I appreciate it.

Though it is supposed to be more of an hour glass shape. The bottom "half" is several inches longer than the top section, just like a person is longer from the hips down than their top half. Just wanted to note that.

 

[dishdude]

 

[raytseng]

it's more like you should've run it by a few people and had at least a few people interested as an alpha stage, so you should've had some interest and not be at 0.

My point about girl scouts is they at least sell to their parents and family and should have that locked down even before starting their campaign.

If you can't convince and sell to people you already know, there's very little chance you're going to convince strangers.

You say individuals told you they wanted them, so why are you at 0?

 

[3for3]

Originally Posted By: raytseng
it's more like you should've run it by a few people and had at least a few people interested as an alpha stage, so you should've had some interest and not be at 0.

My point about girl scouts is they at least sell to their parents and family and should have that locked down even before starting their campaign.

If you can't convince and sell to people you already know, there's very little chance you're going to convince strangers.

You say individuals told you they wanted them, so why are you at 0?


Great point. I have gotten so much good feedback from friends, friends of friends, and family, but not a single backer. I had boutique retailers say they would buy a few to see how it goes, but I have to order several hundred minimum from the manufacturer. Other boutique stores said they spent their budgets for the season, but would consign them. But again, no inventory to consign.

So, that is why I asked for unbiased feedback on here. I know friends and family don't always say whats on their minds. I get mixed feedback from co-workers with the majority being positive. On this website I can get a better feel from a much bigger unbiased audience.

Thank you all, keep the feedback coming.

 

[NMBurb02]

A few thoughts:

You need photos of the towels doing their thing, accentuating the figures of fit people. A weird shaped and not completely flat towel laying on the floor is pretty uninspiring. I can't picture how the towel will provide any aesthetic benefit to the user.

Your pledge rewards are out of whack. Why would I pledge $85 for you to pursue your dream and become fabulously wealthy if all I get out of the deal is a single towel? What will the towels cost at retail? Unless it is $85 I am getting screwed. And if I pledge $25 I get the privledge of advertising for you? And for an additional $40 I get to do it four times over?

 

[Hokiefyd]

Originally Posted By: NMBurb02
You need photos of the towels doing their thing, accentuating the figures of fit people. A weird shaped and not completely flat towel laying on the floor is pretty uninspiring. I can't picture how the towel will provide any aesthetic benefit to the user.


I'll echo this 100%. I go to the beach with a rectangular towel. The premise of your design appears to be that rectangular towels are unappealing and unflattering, yet there is no demonstration of this on your website. You have one image of a female sitting on an hourglass-shaped towel on the sand. Is that how a SunLays is supposed to be used -- laying flat on the beach? Is it supposed to be used as a slimming wrap, as you walk the boardwalk? It's unclear to me, a complete new-comer to the concept, what the benefit is.

 

[spk2000]

Could you try making a smaller quantity at a local place until you see how well it sells to ramp it up. One problem I see is that your product seems to alienate the non fit. Marketing even says that so you have eliminated at least half of your potential buyers. If you could find a way to make the non fit look better that would likely even sell better as everyone wants to look better than they do.

 

[BigCahuna]

How about making a 10 ft round beach towel, so that anyone that lays on it will look small by comparison on it.,,,

 

[Pop_Rivit]

I don't see any real benefit in what you're making and how you're trying to market it. I don't see any benefit to this over a traditional beach towel, even after reading your sites. If there is a pretty girl at the beach she's not any prettier because of the towel. As I looked at the picture on your kickstart site I don't notice the towel at all, and the same would hold true if she were sitting on a traditional beach towel. If you do actually get funded, I don't think you'll sell very many through your website-you need to market where the beachgoers already shop and I don't see anywhere that you have that business in place and ready to go once the towels are manufactured. If I were to invest I'd want to see that there is significant interest in and a developed plan in place to market the product, not just a few vague comments about "worldwide branding". I'd want to see where the concept has already been presented to retailers, and I'd want to know their reactions. Saying you'll do this is one thing, actually doing it is an entirely different animal.

Your website and kickstart site don't mention the price of the beach towels, but I can buy two on Amazon that look very similar to your cabana stripe towel, and I can buy them both for $24. That means you'll need to compete with similar items (albeit a slightly different shape) that have a retail price point of $12. Can you? So far I'm not sold on the idea of the shape being anything special and I'm certainly not willing to pay a premium for it. That means your wholesale price to retailers will need to be in the sub-$10 range.

I think you'd be better off to partner with a couple of businesses that specialize in and retail women's beach accessories. If there really is a potential demand for the product, they'll recognize it and be willing to invest for a chance to be the first to market the product, especially emblazoned with their logo.

As someone who has invested in businesses, I don't see the potential return on just towels alone. As part of a product lineup, possibly. But as a single product by itself I can probably make more by putting my money in a good mutual fund. In other words, your site hasn't sold me on anything except the possibility of getting a bumper sticker for $25 or a towel for $85, neither of which interests me as an investor.

 

[Pablo]

Meh......

We started our business with 3 or 4 ideas and two credit cards, and a small pile of cash. (Emphasis on the word small!)

Towels alone, I agree. Meh.

You have to have a rep, you have to be into it, you have to be the man. You have to have the spark. You have to be the light. Energy, drive all good.....what do you have that others don't have.

I may have missed it, but are you selling locally already? Have a low cost web site? Ebay?

As someone else mentioned, no one in the USA makes towels??? I see probably you wouldn't give up that fat margin you are drooling over, but 150% x 0.00 is still zero. Sell, but don't give up your margin too early.

This crowd and apparently even a slightly larger population have zero desire to send any money into that black hole of a buzz word. Crowd funding.......meh.

Come back and laugh in my face. I will be good with that. I want all USA businesses to succeed.

Good luck and God speed.

 

[AlienBug]

As others have said, I don't see a fortune here.

You are asking people to support a for-profit venture, but offering almost nothing in return. People will donate money to send a sick kid to Disney or get a dog surgery if it got hit by a car, but investors in a business expect to get part of the business in return, not a towel and a bumper sticker.

Your best bet is to either partner with a company like Coppertone or Beachbody that already has a built-in clientele, or maybe to open a specialty towel and T-shirt cart near the parking lot at a beach and go from there.

Also, not to pile on, but it seems to me that even if your concept was sound, couldn't I get the same effect with this:

Seems to me I can make a SunLay out of any towel with a velcro strap. The result would be a tapered towel that is fully customizable for length and amount of taper, with the added bonus that once you're done sitting on the beach, it is a fully functional standard towel.

 

[dishdude]

A towel is a tough sell, especially at that price. If it does become popular, there will be ripoffs coming from China made for pennies.

Another issue I see is you have a very narrow target audience. No men, only women with attractive bodies that are probably trendy. The patterns on the towels look like something I dry my car with or Grandma would be using to sit on the beach.

If you really believe in this, I would redo the Kickstarter page. The patterns on the towel need to be more trendy, have a couple samples produced and do a photoshoot with some pretty girls. The first picture of the girl on the beach is the only good one you have, the pictures of the towels on the living room floor are not flattering at all. You have to redo the pledges, right now they are donations - why would anyone donate their hard earned money to start your business?

 

[3for3]

Thank you all very much. A lot of great feedback like I was hoping for.

 

[Pop_Rivit]

By all means don't get discouraged-I admire and encourage an entrepreneurial drive and spirit and I think it's something that should be nurtured. If you really, passionately believe in the product and you know in your heart that there's a viable market, then by all means pursue it.

I don't think that "crowd funding" is the right startup method though, I think you'd be better selling your two Mazda's, buying cheap beaters to drive, and putting your own capital at risk, assuming you truly believe in your product and are willing to take the risk yourself.

 

[Andrew1972]

Your website, crowd funding site, and photo's showed that you cannot execute the idea to donators, yet. It was terrible, D effort.

Learn, reflect, and try harder next time. Best of luck on next one don't give up. Send some time looking at what others do well and make your own and try again!

 

[JHZR2]

My issue with this is that I just don't get the cost and capital needs.

My wife could easily trim down and re-edge towels to this shape in minutes.

I get it that good beach towels cost a few bucks more than thin, cotton blend junk from wal mart and amazon, but still.

Also, an important factor of a beach towel is to keep you off of the sand and keep enough space to keep a few items off the sand as well. Im not seeing that.

Further, when this wraps around you for drying off, then how does this work?